Pro-Ron Paul super PAC rethinks spending

The main super PAC supporting Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul is reassessing its heavy financial support of the Texas congressman following his disappointing Super Tuesday performance, an official confirmed to POLITICO.

“Yes, we are reassessing our efforts, but we have always felt that we are a part of a larger movement rather than just a single election,” Endorse Liberty super PAC leader Abe Niederhauser said. “We will continue to support Dr. Paul, but ultimately, we support an idea. We will support candidates who uphold the principles of liberty. We may also get involved in some of the Senate and House races.”

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If Endorse Liberty scales back funding, the move could be yet another blow to Paul, who has yet to win a single presidential primary or caucus contest.

Paul logged underwhelming performances in the Super Tuesday caucus states of North Dakota and Alaska, which he considered his best shots at victory.

And despite enjoying passionate support throughout the country, especially among libertarian-leaning Republicans, Paul has been unable to convert it into critical mass at the ballot booth or caucus hall.

Endorse Liberty, for its part, has aggressively attempted to broaden Paul’s appeal, making more than $2.94 million worth of independent expenditures in January — most going toward online advertisements — to benefit him. The super PAC also took in nearly $2.4 million in contributions in January.

Billionaire PayPal founder Peter Thiel has provided the bulk of the super PAC’s funding, contributing about $2.6 million overall and $1.7 million in January alone, according to the latest federal disclosure documents.

But Endorse Liberty, unlike some presidential candidate-specific super PACs such as the pro-Mitt Romney Restore Our Future outfit, has been running thin on available cash: Through January, it reported less than $61,000 on hand.

Readers' Comments (76)

Ron Paul is such a waste. He by far has the best fiscal plan of any candidate in the race. However he has vowed not to defend the U.S. when it comes to foreign affairs. Why is it that he wouldn't want to defend a nation that he plans to bring back to life through fiscal responsibility? Al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood along with Iran and other wicked Middle Eastern regimes would love for Paul to become president so they can run amok and wreak havoc on the planet. If Ron Paul just added some kind of sensible foreign policy he would be all but guaranteed the nomination.

"Endorse Liberty, for its part, has aggressively attempted to broaden Paul’s appeal, making more than $2.94 million worth of independent expenditures in January — most going toward online advertisements"

Ok well their is your problem! Why spend $3 million on online advertisements? Dont they know the people that need to be reached dont use the internet? Really we have the internet generation down and very informative individuals in social networks promoting Paul those funds should have been used to educate the people who get thier info from television or mailers! The older people are who vote and dont understand or know of Ron Paul's stances.

@Neo "To those who say they like Ron Paul except for his foreign policy, I say "I'll take an honest president leading us to peace over a dishonest president leading us to war every time!" Ron Paul would defend this country and go about it the way it was set up Constitutionally. We have lost thousands of lives and trillions of dollars fighting this war on "terror" to the point it has exausted our military and our funds. Do you realize the attacks on 9/11 were intended to have this effect and is exactly what the terrorist wanted. They wanted us to come to them and for us to become financially unstable! Guess what they have succeded. We will have no country to defend if we do not get our financial situation under control and we can not do that fighting these wars and with such military spending. Do people even realize the history of Iran and why they hate us or why these other people hate us? If we just look back at history we over threw Irans government in 1953 and installed an athoritarian government to gain control of the oil. This government oppressed the people and they uprised and took back control in 1979 which is when the whole US embassy hostage took place. They held them hostage to force our government to admit what it had done. We of course did not like this so we supplied Suddam Huesein with weapons, money, and training during the Iran/Iraq wars. This was the bloodiest war in Irans history. We have sanctioned them stopping medical supplies and other necessary items to come in for the innocent population. You want to know why our government is hated well its not hard to understand! I hate what our government does and people dont want to hear the truth. You will probally defend these acftions but until we realize we can not overthrow governments, bomb countries, and act as if we run this world we will be hated. Iran is not a threat to us and that is simple fact. They have no air force, navy, or missile that could reach us. We are all being fooled by war propaganda. Our biggest threat is our debt it brought down Soviet Union when it went to war with Afghanistan and we are looking at the same fate.

I think that you might be the waste. If you don't realize at this point that Paul has every intention of DEFENDING this country then you need to go back to whatever hole you crawled out of a minute ago.

"He by far has the best fiscal plan of any candidate in the race. However he has vowed not to defend the U.S. when it comes to foreign affairs. Why is it that he wouldn't want to defend a nation that he plans to bring back to life through fiscal responsibility?"

Ron Paul definitely has the strongest (and safest, if you are an American) National Defense Plan of all the candidates. He does not want to cut Defense spending, he only wants to stop our intervention overseas (which would incidentally save our government a lot of money, and drastically help to balance our budget, while making us safer at the same time). This would absolutely make us safer because it would help end the blowback and resentment that the countries which we are currently occupying are holding against us. Ron Paul has repeatedly stated that if there is any threat to our National Security, then we declare war and WIN!

I am not nor have I been one of Ron Paul's groupies because of his isolationist rhetoric. It is a proven fact the United States must maintain a fighting force ready to defend any little Nation which is unable to defend itself. Therefore, Paul's stance on closing overseas bases, bringing all the troops home, cut the Defense budget and putting even more people out of work is just downright idiotic.

Second; Paul stated a few days ago that those who live in Tornado Alley and lose everything to a tornado should pay to rebuild out of their own pocket. I assume he meant those who did not have very much or any insurance to cover their loss. Would a President Paul shut down FEMA (which was designed to help those who could not immediately help themselves) just to balance the budget?

Fortunately for America there never will be a President Ron Paul. As an anti-social, loner - even called an outcast - in Congress, there's probably nothing he would accomplish as POTUS. He's had only ONE of his Bills signed into law out of 620 proposed. Paul repeatedly reminds us of how bad the Congress is as evidenced by it 9% approval rating; but he fails to inform us that he has been a member of Congress for more than 23 years; and that HE is a part of the problem. Paul should just cut his loses and go home.

Let me guess, you like Jesus Christ too, just not on the whole loving your neighbor thing. Right?

If you want to protect your home would you:

A) Purchase a home security system, get a guard dog or even hire a security guard

B) Spend TEN TIMES the amount of money in option A and use it to hire mercenaries to go out to all your neighbors' homes and invade them, harass them, and tell them what they can and can't do in their own home.

Scenario B would invite wrath upon you from everyone in the neighborhood. Neighbors who had nothing in common and may never have even met now have one common enemy. YOU. You are now in grave dangerous as your entore community now unites in league against you,.

This is America's foreign policy. Our troops understand this whis is why they overwhelmingly support Dr. Paul.

I like Ron Paul's stance of US strategic pullback. For one, WE ARE BROKE! No amount of hand wringing and pontificating is going to change that little fact. Second, if the world wants peace and safety in the shipping lanes and ethnic cleansing stopped; THEY CAN PAY US TO DO IT. Using the US military as a charitable organization is horribly wasteful and irresponsible. Sorry if it comes off as cold but that is how the numbers shape it out to be; and numbers don't lie, politicians do.

Let me guess, you like Jesus Christ too, just not on the whole loving your neighbor thing. Right?

If you want to protect your home would you:

A) Purchase a home security system, get a guard dog or even hire a security guard

B) Spend TEN TIMES the amount of money in option A and use it to hire mercenaries to go out to all your neighbors' homes and invade them, harass them, and tell them what they can and can't do in their own home.

Scenario B would invite wrath upon you from everyone in the neighborhood. Neighbors who had nothing in common and may never have even met now have one common enemy. YOU. You are now in grave dangerous as your entire community now unites in league against you,.

This is America's foreign policy. Our troops understand this whis is why they overwhelmingly support Dr. Paul.

Neocon Matrix you are just blatantly wrong if not purposefully deceitful stating that Ron Paul would not defend this homeland. He would defend this homeland better than any of the Neo Cons in office the last 12 years. 1. bring troops home 2 refit the military 3 protect our borders 4 invest in strategic subs and other technology Please do a little research instead of aggressively misrepresenting the facts.

American people are too stupid, brainwashed and ignorant to even understand Ron Paul. Better to give the money to Foundation for Economic Education and get people better educated and pray that it is not to late.

You are a complete liar. Ron Paul NEVER said that. Ron Paul is the ONLY Veteran in the race. He is the ONLY one that understands international affairs. He is the only one that is honest in recognizing that our policies caused things like Pearl Harbor and 9/11 and benefitted our enemies. This is why he has the support of more military members than everyone else combined.

No matter how the media spins it or what anybody says, this election is still wide open. Just ask Mitt Romney, who thought for sure he’d have everything locked up by now.

We saw how close these elections can be in Maine.

The ONLY wasted votes are those cast for Romney, Santorum or Gingrich – candidates who stand for NOTHING and who will CHANGE NOTHING.

Those fed up with politics as usual get exactly what they deserve if they vote for the crooked-media / crooked-establishment supported “status quo” politicians.

Cast the only vote that will change things for the better and get at least 2 others to do the same. Vote Ron Paul!

All Ron Paul supporters have to do is EACH recruit at least 2 new voters that will support the Ron Paul Revolution against unconstitutional government and tyranny and ask them to do the same. That’s how we will defeat the crooked, Constitution trashing establishment and the crooked-mega-corporation owned media.

I don’t care what issue you look at, NO other candidate has a better plan ON ANYTHING than Ron Paul has! He is exactly RIGHT on EVERY ISSUE but you have to do a little research to understand why he takes the positions he does. Those that oppose Ron Paul’s platform are simply ignorant of the FACTS, or they oppose the Constitution and the principals this Nation was founded on.

EVERYTHING Ron Paul supports comes straight from the Constitution and the platform of the founders, which once made this Nation the most free and the most prosperous in world history. That’s what the crooked-media is trying to spin as “crazy, out in left field and un-electable”. Don’t be duped! If you want Constitutional government you have to vote for Ron Paul, he’s the ONLY candidate in this race that has a long history of strictly following the Constitution.

Those that rant against Ron Paul’s foreign policy or anything else he supports, simply don’t understand the FACTS. If you are not a Ron Paul supporter I urge you to OPEN YOUR EYES TO THE TRUTH. A great way to get the honest FACTS is by visiting youtube and searching for “RON PAUL DEBATE HIGHLIGHTS”. Then listen to what he is actually saying straight from his own mouth, rather than what the crooked media and the crooked establishment are saying about him.

The choice is simple. Do you want Constitutional liberty and rights or do you want a socialist government that micro-manages everything in your life and attempts to enforce their unconstitutional tyranny on the entire world through unjust, unconstitutional wars.

THE MOST IMPORTANT THING EVERY RON PAUL SUPPORTER CAN DO IS RECRUIT 2 NEW VOTERS AND ASK THEM TO DO THE SAME! Do that and we will win by a landslide in November!

Iran and nukes. So we are concerned about the ‘possibility’ of Iran getting a nuke? What did we do with North Korea when they were in the EXACT same position? What about India? What about China? What about ALL those missing high yield nukes from the collapse of Russia? And we’re concerned about the POSSIBILITY of Iran getting ONE nuke? Iran’s “Air Force” has NO strategic capability (just like their military), Iran is SURROUNDED by nukes, Iran can not produce enough oil for its own citizens or military to threaten the US in ANY credible way. The ONLY legitimate threat Iran offers is ‘duping’ the US into another unneeded/unnecessary war that will only quicken our insolvency. Wait…we already are insolvent. This whole ‘we gotta do something about Iran’ theory is nothing more than war mongering from the NeoCons, for their businesses. BTW I have a fleet of radio control planes in my basement…does that count as an “Air Force”?

What do you expect when the MSM refuses to give him the time of day? he origionaly was doing well and they would not even mention him, now since then they remind you of every time he does lousy in the polling. If the alleged republican party in this nation wants to finger romney and then give the rest of us the finger fine in the mean time barry the commie will win a second term because I sure am not voting for any of them.